


Absolution

by misha_anon



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Bunker Fic, Demon Dean, Drabble, Established Relationship, M/M, No Sex, Post-Episode: s10e03 Soul Survivor, s10e03 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-03
Updated: 2014-11-03
Packaged: 2018-02-24 00:59:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 880
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2562281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misha_anon/pseuds/misha_anon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean can't avoid the conversation with Castiel he's dreaded since he became fully human again, but it doesn't go quite the way he thought it would.  <i>Non-specific mentions of Dean's actions under the influence of the MoC, no *actual* demon!Dean, though.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Absolution

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sort of coda to episode 3, I suppose. _How's that for specificity?_ I just felt like Dean needs someone to tell him he's still an okay person.

It's the first night Dean has shared a bed with Castiel since his return to humanity.  For three nights, he made excuses; last night he didn't even bother, he just never went to bed.  Tonight, though, Cas refused to budge from his side until it became crystal clear that whether they went to bed or sat at the table all night, they'd be doing it together.  After undressing in darkness save the alarm clock's muted glow, they crawled into opposite sides of the bed in silence.  

Even as Dean crowds himself against the edge of his side of the bed to avoid inadvertently touching Castiel, he can see the way Cas sprawls comfortably on his own side.  For the briefest of moments, he's jealous of the pillow under Castiel's head and the blanket pulled across his hips.  He's jealous that inanimate objects deserve to touch the man he loves more than his own wicked hands do.  Dean closes his eyes so he won't have to see, swallowing down the bitter lump in his throat.

He wants desperately to touch Castiel, to be held and to find reassurance that maybe there's something in him that's salvageable.  But, even with stolen grace, the man in his bed is no man.  He's still an angel; still of Heaven.  To touch him with hands that have done what Dean's have would be  _profane_.   Castiel shifts on the other side of the bed, probably wriggling his way down into the memory foam the way he does every night, squirming until he finds the perfect position.  The warm hand on Dean's cheek sends hisblood running cold through his veins and a gasp slipping out before he can stop it.

"Cas," Dean whispers, reaching up to curl fingers around Cas' delicate wrist.  

His heart beats faster and despite his firm intention to push Castiel away, he finds himself holding on instead.  As Dean clings in the darkness Cas cradles his face, the pad of his thumb stroking slowly, soothingly against Dean's cheekbone.  It's all the comfort he craves and everything he can't allow himself to have.  Reluctantly, he pushes Castiel's hand away; but he doesn't let go.  Dean compromises with himself, letting his thumb rest over the steady pulse that surges through Castiel's wrist.

The silence stretches for a moment, then two, and Cas moves neither to pull away nor to touch Dean again.  He simply lies close and quiet, his wrist held firmly in the circle of Dean's fingers.  Another moment passes and Dean's chest loosens, his lungs filling with air for what feels like the first time in years only for the breath to whoosh out in a sigh.  Castiel sighs, too, soft and relieved; but, he still doesn't move.  Dean's stomach burns with regret - with shame - as a flood of words poises on the tip of his tongue.

"I did terrible things," he says finally.  His fingers tighten reflexively around Castiel's wrist as he confesses, afraid if he doesn't hold on, he'll be left alone.

"I know," Castiel says simply.

"You can't imagine the things I have done, Cas," Dean says, trying not to squirm with embarrassment.

"I know," Castiel says again.  A pause, then, "But it wasn't you."

"It was me," Dean says.  He'd expected that argument, he's got his defense ready.  "It was the most  _me_  I have ever been.  Me, unplugged. Me, with everything stripped away.  It was everything I really am."

He barely gets the last words out before he bites his lip as hard as he can.   _This_.  This is why he didn't come to bed for nearly a week.  This is the conversation he's avoided at every turn.  Of course Castiel doesn't understand the things Dean has done; how could he?

" _Dean_ ," Castiel says sharply.  Dean draws an equally sharp breath, stopped in his tracks by the rebuking tone.  He holds his breath as the words spill from Castiel's lips into the space between their bodies, each one more certain than the last:  "Unless you think Sam was 'everything he really is' when he drank demon blood or that I was 'everything I really am' with Leviathan tearing me apart from the inside out, you can't say that the Mark of Cain made  _you_  everything you really are." _  
_

Dean lies in stunned silence, tears stinging the corners of his eyes as he tries to process Castiel's words.  He probes the words for flaws or inconsistency, looks for a loophole with which to hang himself.  His breath comes in quick bursts as the first hot tear leaks from the corner of his eye, his shoulders shaking with the sheer  _force_  of Castiel's absolution.

"I know you," Castiel says, his voice soft once more.

He lifts his hand, Dean's fingers still clinging desperately to his slim wrist, and wipes away the tears as they slide across the bridge of his nose and down his cheek to wet the pillowcase beneath his head.  Dean swallows, but he can't stop the flood of tears now that it's started; he doesn't even  _really_  want to.  Cas reaches up with his free hand and clasps it lightly over Dean's.  

"I  _know_  you, Dean Winchester," Cas says again, "and whatever terrible things these hands might have done, the man I know is  _not_  responsible for."


End file.
